Munich startup Differential Bio emerged from stealth today with €2 million in pre-seed funding to redefine biomanufacturing.
Its Virtual Scale-up Platform seamlessly integrates advanced microbiology, lab automation, and artificial intelligence, unlocking unprecedented speed and efficiency to optimise and scale bioprocesses.
By eliminating critical bottlenecks, Differential Bio is not just improving biomanufacturing — it’s transforming it into a smarter, faster, and more scalable industry.
Biomanufacturing, which harnesses biological systems like microbial cells to produce everything from food ingredients to pharmaceuticals, offers a promising solution. Yet, despite its potential, the industry faces a significant hurdle: scaling bioprocesses from lab to industrial levels is notoriously slow and prohibitively expensive.
Differential Bio’s Virtual Scale-up Platform integrates three core innovations: advanced microbiology to miniaturise fermentation processes, robotics to automate lab workflows and generate high-quality data, and AI algorithms to simulate and optimize bioprocesses virtually.
This synergy minimises reliance on costly and resource-intensive physical experiments, delivering precise insights into critical factors such as biomass growth rates, metabolite production, and cell viability.
The outcome? Faster optimisation cycles, significant cost reductions through automation, and enhanced profitability thanks to higher yields and improved process efficiency.
“Biomanufacturing holds the key to a regenerative future, but scaling these processes remains a major bottleneck for the industry” said Christian Spier, CEO of Differential Bio, reflecting on the average 5-10 years and $100-500 million it takes to develop novel bioproducts.
“But we are here to change that, empowering biomanufacturers with cutting-edge tools to slash development timelines and costs, bringing bio-based products to market faster than ever before.”
Differential Bio has already demonstrated the transformative power of its technology in the probiotics industry where the company tackled a dual challenge: transitioning a microbial strain from an animal-based to a plant-based growth medium while maintaining performance.
Using its Virtual Scale-up Platform resulted in a 4x increase in biomass yield – boosting production efficiency — and a 16 per cent reduction in production costs.
Ananda Impact Ventures and ReGen Ventures led the funding round with participation from Carbon13, Climate Capital, Better Ventures, CDTM Ventures, alongside a prominent group of angel investors.
“The Differential team immediately stood out to us with their exceptional combination of deep technical expertise, innovative scientific approach, and a visionary drive to deliver impactful solutions at scale,” said Bernd Klosterkemper, Partner at Ananda Impact Ventures.
“We believe their technology will redefine biomanufacturing by enabling faster, more efficient scaling of bio-based processes, accelerating the global transition to a sustainable, green, and circular economy.”
“Biomanufacturing is constrained by a scaling crisis. By leveraging machine learning on extensive phenotypic and bioprocess data, Differential has the potential to redefine biomanufacturing at scale by providing a step function reduction in cost and time to commercialisation,” said Tom McQuillen Partner at ReGen Ventures.
Differential Bio will direct the funds towards enhancing the Virtual Scale-up Platform to tackle increasingly complex bioprocesses, from multi-strain systems to novel bio-products, scaling its automated “self-driving lab”, recruiting top talent, and onboarding new clients.
Lead image: Differential Bio. Photo: uncredited.
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https://tech.eu/2025/03/26/differential-bio-emerges-from-stealth-with-2m-funding-to-solve-biomanufacturing-s-scaling-problem/